UPM_News_2016

SWIPE is a magazine

that gives the 20–35 year-

old millennial audience the

variety of content that they

want, but in print –

the medium that they still

prefer to read in.

SWIPE:

the best

of the web in print

We chat with

Tom Rendell

, publisher of

SWIPE, a fortnightly magazine that publishes

a print digest of articles originally posted on

the Internet. Its target audience consists of

London millennials: 25–30 year-olds living and

working in the UK capital. A total of 15,000

copies are distributed at London underground

stations and 5,000 at selected locations such

as offices and cafes.

How did you come up with the

idea?

My business partner

Barney Gui-

ton

and I were working together at

Newsweek

, where we learnt a lot about

creating and publishing a high-quali-

ty magazine. We’ve also worked in on-

line media start-ups prior to that, and

thought about a media brand that could

incorporate the reading experience of

print with the amazing variety of the

internet. The result is SWIPE, a maga-

zine that we feel gives the 20–35 year-

old millennial audience the variety of

content that they want, but in print – the

medium that they still prefer to read in.

Why did you choose to go with

print?

We know that people still love print,

but print magazines haven’t been do-

ing enough to interest audiences in the

face of major competition from online

publishing. It’s not that print is dead

but it has perhaps failed to innovate. As

much as 81% of people still prefer to

read in print across all age groups – in-

cluding the first digital generation, mil-

lennials – but the content has to be ex-

cellent to keep their attention. It’s also

about getting the right type of content

on the right platform; social media and

videos are designed to be consumed on

mobile but long-form journalism and

great photography – of which there is

so much online – is still far better en-

joyed in print.

What are the strengths of print in

terms of trying to reach millennials?

Print is booming in London at the

moment – but as long as your distribu-

tion model is free. Millennials won’t

pay for print but they’ll happily take a

free magazine if it’s correctly targeted

at them. The good thing about free print

is you can target distribution very ef-

fectively. At SWIPE we focus on Tube

stations in south, central and east Lon-

don where our target audience live and

work. As well as publishing the best of

social media, Instagram and fun trend-

ing stories, SWIPE also has a long-read

feature each week, which can focus on

politics, travel, food – almost anything.

There’s amazing writing, reporting and

opinion online from sites like Roads &

Kingdoms, but it can be hard to find

online in an environment dominated by

SEO, clickbait and social media shout-

ing. We want to help our readers find

amazing writing and content that they

would have otherwise missed, and a

print magazine gives them the perfect

environment in which to do that.

What do you think the future will

hold for print media?

It’s encouraging to see the increas-

ing competition and variety on offer in

print. This can only be a good thing and

will keep readers interested. Print has

to continue to focus on what it’s good at

– discovery, quality, interest – and keep

standards high. If the standard of print

publishing drops in order to make ad-

vertisers happy, readers will just go on-

line.

What about the relationship be-

tween print and digital?

Going forward I think it’s impor-

tant to focus less on the print-online di-

vide. It’s the content that’s important,

whether its being consumed on Snap-

chat, Mashable or The Sunday Times

Magazine. Readers have more options

than ever at their fingertips so publish-

ers have to work hard to keep their in-

terest, and then work hard to advertis-

ers to show they have an engaged audi-

ence that is worth reaching.

Text:

Mari Hirvi

Photo:

SWIPE

UPM

NEWS